Lawson Smart Office consolidates the end-user experience by bringing together enterprise applications, business intelligence, desktop tools, and group collaboration. The decision-makers benefit from having content tools and context to help them work in a more productive and successful manner.
Allows for Quicker more Efficient Dissemination of Data into Excel and back into Lawson – Anytime a user is viewing a listing through a Lawson form – for example transactions in GL90, or JEs awaiting release in GL45 – those can be exported into Excel with the touch of a button. Data can be updated in Excel and then uploaded back into Lawson in a few simple steps. Today that user would have to bring up the Excel Addins and create a query. Since most Lawson forms rely on a series of tables, the user would build those relationships, select appropriate criteria and if the system timed out, cycle back and start over again. Or they would find an approximate report and then create a CSV, cleaning off excess columns and rows to have a workable set. Once they had reviewed and edited their data set, they would then need to create an upload wizard and carefully map each column to the appropriate field on a form, often attempting multiple uploads. In the Smart Office of tomorrow they skip all of these steps and focus on the task at hand.
Enables a Modern Collaborative Environment – Smart Office allows a Lawson user to share information with another user via integrated instant message. For example, when someone is looking at GL90 transactions in portal and needs a colleague to help them research or understand those GL postings, they cannot share the dynamic data they have displayed on their screen. Some customers have created extensive customizations in order to enable this, but it’s readily available functionality to anyone that deploys Smart Office.
Empowers Super Users to Streamline their Functions – Wasted time clicking on forms, or tabbing through an endless set of fields designed for functions your business will never need – Smart Office ends these wasted moments by empowering super users to re-contextualize their work space to meet the needs of how they work. If they always enter the same three fields on the same form (even across multiple tabs), in Smart Office they can lay them out them sequentially, streamlining each process and achieving maximum speed. If they look up related information on a separate Lawson token, they can bring that data into the same space where they perform their work and it will be there, every time they come back. In the quest for optimal processes, every click counts.
Integrates with Enterprise Search – Enterprise search is the future of ERP. The ability to type in a word and get all associated records (vendors, items, purchases, GL accounts) associated with the term will greatly enhance the capability of power users to make the system work for them. Smart Office integrates with this functionality and is the first step towards its deployment.
Compatible with Lawson 10 – Although Portal is replaced with Workspace in version 10, Smart Office continues to be the preferred user interface for heads down Lawson users. Rolling out Smart Office today gives you a leg up on your Lawson 10 upgrade.